Several states, including Assam, Telangana, Maharashtra, and Punjab have recommended an extension of the lockdown for the remaining of the month to contain the spread of the infection in the states, while others including Delhi, Haryana, Karnataka have suggested a gradual easing of restrictions.

Meanwhile, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the fifth and last tranche of the Rs 20,000-lakh crore economic relief package on Sunday. Sitharaman said that in the last four days of announcements, the government has had several reforms addressing the land, labour, liquidity, and laws, and added that the last tranche of announcements will be a continuation to that.

Here are some top developments in India today:

A motorcyclist wearing a protective mask travels past shuttered stores and businesses on a deserted street during a partial lockdown imposed due to the coronavirus at a town in the Gautam Buddh Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh. (Photographer: Prashanth Vishwanathan/Bloomberg)

India reported an unusually high number of new cases as well as recoveries on Saturday, thanks to adjustments made by Gujarat and Punjab. Gujarat reported results of a special drive it had carried out over the last one week in Ahmedabad to look for potential ‘spreaders’. With 354 more cases discovered throughout the state, Gujarat reported 1057 new cases on Saturday, the highest ever on any single day.

In Punjab, 952 positive, but asymptomatic, cases were sent back to their homes, following new guidelines that allow asymptomatic cases to be isolated at home. Close to 850 of these asymptomatic cases are returnees from Nanded. On Saturday, Bihar and Odisha also reported their highest numbers so far. Bihar reported 145 cases to take its total to 1178, while Odisha discovered 91 cases to reach 737.

Stranded in cities due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown, migrant workers have sought to go home (Express Photo by Prem Nath Pandey)

Thanks to the high numbers from Gujarat, the country recorded as many as 4,874 new cases on Saturday, a new single-day high. For the last one week, between 3,500 and 3,800 cases were being reported every day. The previous high of 4,370 was recorded on May 10, last Saturday.

With no new case reported for three days consecutively and 11 more patients discharged on Saturday, the UT’s tally of active Covid-19 patients has fallen significantly while the recovery rate of has increased to more than 20 per cent.

Women wait for bus after getting a pass from district administration to go to their home in an Assam State Transport Corporation vehicle (ASTC) during the nationwide lock down in the wake of coronavirus pandemic in Guwahati. (Express photo: Dasarath Deka)

The 11 patients include 11 from Bapu Dham Colony and one from Sector 30. Both these areas are considered hotspots. Of the total 191 cases in the city, 51 have been discharged and three have passed away, leaving 137 active cases.

The ten Bapu Dham Colony residents discharged from PGIMER’s Nehru Extension Block on Saturday include eight men aged between 17 and 50 years and two women aged 21 and 27 years. The 11th patient from Sector 30 is a 40-year-old man. All tested negative for the virus before being discharged.

4 fresh COVID-19 cases in Assam; count rises to 95

Four fresh novel coronavirus cases have been reported in Assam, taking the state’s tally to 95, Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Sunday. Of the new cases, two are from Guwahati city and one each from Sonitpur and Sivasagar districts. The patients were admitted to hospitals early on Sunday morning, he said.

Arts college student making a painting on a city road goes to Mankameshwar temple on coronavirus epidemic on the occasion of world earth day in Lucknow on Wednesday. (Express photo by Vishal Srivastav)

Two of the four patients were in quarantine centres in Guwahati and Jorhat, he said. Two patients have been admitted to the Mahendra Mohan Choudhury Hospital (MMCH) in Guwahati and one each in Tezpur Medical College and Hospital and Jorhat Medical College and Hospital, Sarma said. Of the 95 cases, 50 are active and 41 persons have recovered while two have died and two have migrated.

Two more die of COVID-19 in Odisha, 91 new cases detected

Odisha reported two more COVID-19 deaths, taking the total number of virus fatalities in the state to five, an official of the health department said on Sunday. The total number of coronavirus cases in the state rose to 828, with 91 fresh cases reported in the last 24 hours, the official said.

Bhadrak district accounted for the maximum number of fresh cases at 28, followed by Balasore at 17, Ganjam at 15, Cuttack at 12 and Puri at seven. Earlier, two persons from Bhubaneswar and another from Ganjam had succumbed to the disease, the official said. Of the five deaths reported so far, three are from Ganjam.

Two people die of coronavirus in Rajasthan, 70 fresh cases

Rajasthan recorded two deaths due to coronavirus and 70 positive cases of the virus on Sunday, an official said. The deaths were reported from Jaipur, taking the total number of COVID-19 fatalities in the state to 128. A total of 70 fresh cases were reported on Sunday and 36 of them are from Jaipur alone.

Vadodara ABVP workers took to art to urge residents to stay home to contain the spread of Covid-19. (Express photo/Bhupendra Rana)

The 36 cases in Jaipur include 11 from central jail and three from district jail, the official said. Dungarpur and Bikaner reported 18 and 5 cases respectively, while two cases were reported each from Kota and Jhunjhunu and one each from Ajmer, Barmer, Dausa, Pratapgarh, Nagaur and Karauli.

33 more test positive for COVID-19 in Bihar, total count 1,178

At least 33 more people, including a 65-year-old woman, have tested positive for COVID-19 in Bihar, raising the total count in the state to 1,178, a top health department official said.

At Azadpur Sabzi Mandi during the nationwide lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus, at Adarsh Nagar in New Delhi, Thursday, (Express Photo By Amit Mehra)

Of the 33 that tested positive, Madhubani district accounts for the maximum number of cases at 14, followed by Bhojpur at six and Samastipur at three, Sanjay Kumar, the principal secretary of the state health department, said. Two cases each were reported from Jamui, Purnea and Siwan and one each from Patna, Bhagalpur, Kaimur and Lakhisarai, he said.

One more COVID-19 case in Goa; state tally rises to 16

A woman passenger who travelled to Goa in a Delhi-Thiruvananthapuram Rajdhani train on Saturday has tested positive for coronavirus, taking the total number of such cases in the state to 16, a health official said on Sunday. The woman’s samples came out positive in the TrueNat (rapid) testing, the official said, adding that her samples have also been sent to the virology lab of the state-run Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMCH) for final confirmation.

Barricades in place near the India Gate in New Delhi on Friday. The Centre has decided to extend the nationwide lockdown for two more weeks from May 4 to stem the spread of the coronavirus. (Express photo by Amit Mehra)

Out of 323 passengers of the train who arrived at Madgaon railway station in South Goa district on Saturday, the woman is the third person to have tested positive for the coronavirus infection. On Saturday evening, samples of two men who alighted from the same train came out positive for coronavirus in the TrueNat test. Their final test report at GMCH also confirmed COVID-19, the official said.

Four persons test positive for COVID-19 in Manipur

Four persons, including three women, tested positive for COVID-19 in Manipur, taking the total number of active cases in the state to five, officials said on Saturday. Of the fresh patients, two have returned from Mumbai, one from Chennai and one from Kolkata, they said.

Hyderabad: Thermal screening of visitors being conducted outside an emergency ward at a hospital during a nationwide lockdown in the wake of coronavirus pandemic, in Hyderabad. (PTI Photo)

Two Mumbai returnees, a 75-year-old woman and a 48- year-old man, had reached Imphal on May 14 in a hired vehicle and were placed under quarantine at the RD Wing in Lamphel, which had been set up to quarantine patients returning from other states following treatment, they said. One of the two underwent treatment at the Tata Memorial Hospital there.

Pune reported as many as 11 deaths due to coornavirus disease (Covid-19) and the highest single-day spike in cases so far, 228, on Saturday. The toll due to Covid-19 rose to 197, while the total number of patients has gone up to 3,795. District Collector Naval Kishore Ram told The Indian Express that the administration was planning another audit to review the cases.

“We are also puzzled. On some days, there is a spike in the number of deaths of critical patients… The earlier review showed that in some cases there was a delay in hospitalisation of patients but in other cases, they found that despite more than 15-20 days of treatment, the patients succumbed to the infection,” said the district collector. He pointed out that several patients with co-morbidities have also recovered and been discharged.

Maharashtra reported 67 deaths due to coronavirus disease (Covid-19) on Saturday, of which 41 deaths were recorded in Mumbai, according to data from the state Health Department. A total of 1,606 new Covid-19 cases were reported from across the state on Saturday. The state tally of COVID-19 positive patients is now 30,706 and the toll has gone up to 1,135.

Reaching out: Two women offer food to another in Chennai. (Source: PTI)

Seven deaths each were reported in Pune and Thane, five in Aurangabad, three in Jalgaon, two in Mira-Bhayandar and one each in Nashik and Solapur. Of the 67 deaths on Saturday, 47 patients were men and 20 women. Thirty eight of them were over 60 years old, 25 were from the age group of 40 to 59 years, and four were younger than 40 years. Forty four out of 67 patients (66 per cent) had high-risk co-morbidities such as diabetes, hypertension and heart disease.